Is it true that the greater the extent of breast cancer removal, the better the result?

In the past, domestic women with breast cancer often came to the hospital because they unintentionally found a lump on their breast. Recent survey data show that even if a lump is found, the average time of pre-hospital visit is 6 months, perhaps because most breast cancers do not have special discomfort, or they are negligent because there is no discomfort, or they are shy to seek medical attention, clinical cases of local rupture are not uncommon. About 60% of these cases have axillary lymph node metastasis when they come to the hospital for diagnosis, and about 10% have already developed metastasis to distant organs such as liver, lung and bone and lost the chance of radical treatment. However, the advances in surgery in the last two decades, the update of radiotherapy instruments, and more importantly, the combination of postoperative adjuvant endocrine drugs, targeted drugs and encyclopedic paclitaxel drugs have made the majority of early breast cancers curable. The previous treatment of removing the entire breast once breast cancer is detected has been challenged. Practice has proven that for appropriate early stage breast cancer cases, there is no significant difference between the treatment effect of removing the entire breast and preserving the breast, that is, the effect of removing the breast and only a part of it is similar. In fact, the reason is simple: for an apple with a wormhole, what about removing half of it, or removing part of it can solve the wormhole problem.  Limited by traditional opinions and neglect of quality of life, more than half of the women who could keep their breasts are adamant about having them removed, and more commonly, they regret several years later that they should have kept them, with a sense of remorse. Is there a basis for breast removal? If listing dozens of relevant research data, it will be too professional for the general public to understand, we still cite the recently updated “Breast Cancer Clinical Practice Guidelines 2013 Edition” as evidence as follows. It needs to be emphasized that it is not better to remove the larger the scope, what is suitable is the best, and excessive surgery does not have any benefit except increasing trauma.  At present, the breast-conserving rate of breast cancer in large domestic breast specialties is about 10%-15%, and individual centers are as high as 50%. In fact, the high or low breast-conserving rate does not exactly represent the level of doctors, but a lot has to do with the early or late disease itself and the patients’ own willingness and acceptance, and of course the role model of patients in hospital during hospitalization is equally important. Our breast surgery team at Xinhua Hospital has a breast-conserving and reconstruction rate of about 30%, which is advanced in China mainly for three reasons: 1) the level of early diagnosis, which mainly depends on the level of the imaging department and the number of patients’ active medical examinations; 2) adequate pre-surgical communication, which is mainly due to the fact that we fully develop individualized and optimal treatment plans according to the characteristics of the disease before surgery. We are willing to spend enough time to communicate with patients about the advantages and disadvantages of different treatment strategies to help them make a reasonable choice.3 Precise excisional scope and advanced plastic surgery techniques: for cases with significant breast transformation after partial excision of the tumor, breast conservation is usually abandoned, and we can restore the shape of the breast and reduce the occurrence of deformities through advanced plastic surgery techniques, thus increasing the breast conservation rate and improving the patient’s psychological trauma. For example, the original “Lateral chest wall perforator fascial flap in breast conserving surgery” by our Xinhua team was invited to speak at the Cross-Straits Breast Cancer Forum in Kaohsiung, Taiwan in March this year. For example, our team completed the first case of “lumpectomy-assisted latissimus dorsi” for breast reconstruction in Shanghai with 20131231, which reduces the back incision, reduces trauma and helps to recover faster after surgery.